Penn State scandal: Jerry Sandusky in jail, legal battles continue

From a CNN report on Mike McQueary, a new detail on the former Penn State assistant coach who told former head coach Joe Paterno about witnessing former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky committing sexual assault:

Sandusky’s sexual assaults of adolescent males eventually led to an effective life sentence for Sandusky, along with unusual NCAA sanctions (later revoked) against the school and three former PSU admins being sentenced for child endangerment.

Al Pacino will work alongside director Barry Levinson to star as Joe Paterno in an upcoming movie for HBO centered on the longtime Penn State coach and focused on his inaction during the school’s sexual abuse scandal.

Variety reports that pre-production is underway, with the film’s official logline saying:

Penn State hasn’t formally memorialized former football coach Joe Paterno since he died in January 2012. The following summer, the university removed the statue of Paterno that had sat outside Beaver Stadium, and it’s been gone ever since.

This weekend, the school will pay an organized tribute to the man whose 46-year run leading the program ended in 2011 amid the Jerry Sandusky sexual abuse scandal.

Joe Paterno’s legacy has been the subject of pitched debate since the 2011 revelation that longtime Penn State assistant Jerry Sandusky had allegedly committed dozens of counts of sexual abuse against minors while on Paterno’s staff, for which Sandusky was eventually convicted.

This week in court documents and an interview given to CNN, one of Sandusky’s victims declares the former Penn State head coach was aware of Sandusky’s abuse and helped to cover it up.

When the NCAA was determining how to punish Penn State for the Jerry Sandusky scandal, certain members of the college sports governing body felt it didn’t really have jurisdiction to punish the school’s athletic program, as revealed by certain internal emails uncovered by Onward State. (Penn State has responded to the story.)

The NCAA certainly didn’t come to its decisions lightly. However, the organization appears to have been working to justify a punishment it was already leaning toward.

Just under a year after the hard-hitting Freeh Report alleged that Graham Spanier was one of several who took part in covering up the sex crimes of Jerry Sandusky, the former Penn State president is suing Louis Freeh with claims that his character was defamed by untrue statements in the report, according to the Associated Press.

Spanier, alongside former athletic director Tim Curley, vice president Gary Schultz, and most controversially, Joe Paterno, was said to protect Sandusky by keeping the facts of his case from reaching authorities or the public in the Freeh Report. It’s not precisely clear what he claims is false about Freeh’s findings, but presumably it has to do with those allegations. Spanier, Curley, and Schultz still face criminal charges for their role in the cover-up, and all three maintain their innocence. The report claims that Spanier told investigators he was unaware of Sandusky’s claims, but concluded that he wasn’t telling them the truth.

Pennsylvania governor Tom Corbett’s antitrust lawsuit against the NCAA was thrown out of federal court Thursday morning, according to an Associated Press report. As SB Nation’s Robert Wheel noted months ago, the suit was probably dead on arrival because the state of Pennsylvania did not have standing under federal law. U.S. Middle District Court Judge Yvette Kane’s decision to toss it out confirms as much.

Corbett filed the suit in January, and he had hoped to get the sanctions levied against Penn State’s football program removed. He argued that the “citizens and businesses of Pennsylvania have been harmed” and that the NCAA failed to follow its own bylaws.

The 65-player limit will kick in starting in 2014 and last until the conclusion of the 2018 season. Right now Penn State stands at 67 scholarship players and could try and reach that 65-player limit this season. That way the Nittany Lions would look to advance their scholarship reductions at least a year earlier in the 2017 season. But the NCAA seems to be set that the punishment will last five years regardless, so the period of the punishment would not be reduced.

The NCAA handed down a substantial package of punishment on Penn State, with bowl bans spanning four years, 13 seasons wiped from the record books, a $60 million fine, and the aforementioned scholarship reductions.

Filmmaker John Ziegler is working on a documentary meant to serve as a defense of former Penn State head coach Joe Paterno. He had the opportunity to speak at length with Jerry Sandusky about a number of topics, including Mike McQueary, who was a key witness against Sandusky during his trial. Sandusky, who chose not to testify during that trial, told Ziegler that he could not understand how McQueary decided “that sex was going on” when he witnessed Sandusky showering with a child in 2001.

Audio of the interview aired on NBC’s Today Show on Monday morning. The Paterno family issued a statement through attorney Wick Sollers in response to the interview of Sandusky, calling it “transparently self-serving” and denouncing it as a “misguided and inappropriate” attempt at defending Joe Paterno.

It looks as if former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky will exhaust every legal option available to appeal his conviction on child sex abuse charges. According to Sports Illustrated, Sandusky’s lawyer, Joseph Amendola, has filed an appeal in Superior Court seeking to overturn Sandusky’s 30 to 60 year sentence after being convicted on 45 counts of child sex abuse. It’s not clear what issue Amendola will address in his appeal to the higher court.

This isn’t the first time Sandusky and his legal team have filed paperwork for an appeal of some sort. In October, ESPN reported Sandusky’s team was seeking a new trial, contending, among other grievances, they weren’t given adequate time to prepare. The Centre Daily Times reported in November Sandusky’s lawyers were seeking more time to get their case together and when their appeal was ultimately heard in January, Judge John Cleland denied all their motions.

The NCAA is filing a suit against Gov. Tom Corbett and several other Pennsylvania state officials to prevent a law that would require the NCAA from spending the $60 million they received in sanctions from Penn State in the state itself.

This suit -- not related to Corbett’s lawsuit against the NCAA, which contests the NCAA’s right to impose said sanctions, which SB Nation’s legal analyst broke down in January -- argues that the law is unconstitutional. States can’t make legislation that regulates interstate commerce, and the NCAA argues that by telling a private entity where they can spend their money, Pennsylvania is doing so.

Joe Paterno was never convicted of a crime. He wasn’t even indicted for one. You can’t prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he was involved in covering up Jerry Sandusky’s crimes. That’s why, unlike former athletic director Tim Curley and vice president Gary Schultz, Paterno was not indicted by a Pennsylvania grand jury.

The Paterno Report does an excellent job of validating the prosecutor’s decision not to indict Paterno. Other than that, it only serves to obfuscate the coach’s legacy.

The family of Joe Paterno released a report commissioned to examine the Freeh Report Sunday on ESPN’s Outside the Lines. The Freeh Report was written by former FBI director Louis Freeh and commissioned by Penn State to examine the involvement of Paterno and other University officials in the Jerry Sandusky child sexual abuse scandal. The report was extremely critical of Paterno, saying he failed to act despite having evidence of Sandusky’s crimes and acted in a conspiracy to conceal Sandusky’s activities.

The Paterno family’s review of the Freeh Report was handled by three investigators: Former Pennsylvania governor and Attorney General Dick Thornburgh, former FBI Special Agent James Clemente, and Fred Berlin, Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Johns Hopkins. The reports, presented and summarized by Wick Sollers, managing partner of King & Spalding, a Washington, D.C. law firm, allege that the Freeh investigation was “fundamentally flawed” and relied upon flimsy evidence in reaching its conclusions. The summary of their findings has been posted to Paterno.com, and is provided below:

The family of Joe Paterno will release their report regarding the Freeh Report on Sunday, according to the Centre Daily Times. The report will be released at 9 a.m. ET on Sunday morning on ESPN’s Outside The Lines. Sue Paterno, who recently wrote a letter to Penn State’s football lettermen explaining the family’s actions, recently interviewed with Katie Couric, and that interview will air the following Monday on ABC’s “Katie.”

The family announced that they would look into the report commissioned by Penn State, headed by former FBI director Louis Freeh, and it would appear that they’ve come up with roughly 180 pages of documentation in rebuttal.

The NCAA filed papers in federal court Thursday saying that Pennsylvania governor Tom Corbett’s lawsuit should be dismissed.

This is pretty much a game of he-said she-said applied to jurisdictional legalese. The governor’s suit implies that the NCAA went too far by fining Penn State $60 million and imposing major sanctions on the school’s football team in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky scandal, saying that they don’t have the authority to do so. The NCAA’s filing says that the governor went too far by filing an antitrust suit, which would apply to regulation of economic activity, not something the NCAA argues it deals with. From the AP:

Former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky’s lawyers contend their client did not receive a fair trial last summer. They argue that they did not have enough time to digest material presented to them and do the necessary research for the defense of their client.

“Counsel had no time to review the aforesaid material in search of persons who could testify to the poor reputation for truthfulness on the part of any of the complainants, any alibi, or any connection between the complainants that would impair their credibility,” Sandusky’s attorneys argued.

As I have stated before, the NCAA is a banana republic that deserves to be litigated to death. So when Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett’s sued the NCAA for imposing sanctions against Penn State my reaction was, “all right, stick it to the man!”

But then I looked at the actual complaint. The lawsuit sucks and will likely get thrown out of court. And if you look at the circumstantial evidence, this all seems like a political stunt and waste of taxpayer money, even if it is in pursuit of a deserving adversary. So let’s do a Q&A with a made-up non-attorney to explain why this lawsuit is a turd.

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett announced Wednesday the commonwealth will sue the NCAA, claiming it had “no authority and operated outside their bylaws” when it sanctioned Penn State. This comes just a few months after he made this remark:

The NCAA responded by calling the lawsuit “an affront” to Jerry Sandusky’s victims -- Dan Wetzel reports victim No. 4 is upset with the NCAA for making such a claim.

The state of Pennsylvania is planning to take the NCAA to court and challenge the sanctions against Penn State in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky scandal, multiple sources have told Sports Illustrated’s Pete Thamel.

According to Thamel, the details of the lawsuit are still unclear. However, it is believed the state is looking to overturn or reduce the NCAA’s penalties against PSU. An announcement from the state, which could come as soon as Wednesday, should provide more details on the case. From Thamel:

Update: Graham Spanier has been charged with eight crimes, including three felonies. Via Sara Ganim.

Former Penn State president Graham Spanier will be indicted on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice Tuesday in connection to the Jerry Sandusky scandal, reports Paula Reed Ward of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

Settlement negotiation have begun between Penn State and the 20-25 men who have accused former Nittany Lion defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky of sexual abuse. According to attorneys for the school, negotiations are proceeding in “good faith,” and the Board of Trustees has approved a resolution for a legal subcommittee to approve possible settlements, as well as the authority to set “dollar limits.”

The most recent meeting of the Board of Trustees was called specifically to address settlement issues. While the board granted the legal subcommittee authority to set dollar limits, an amount for such limits has not been discussed. Five of the accusers have current legal action pending against the University, while the others have come forward through counsel.

Aaron Fisher, the person previously know as ‘Victim 1’ in the case against Jerry Sandusky, revealed his identity in an interview with ABC news that will be aired on Friday.

The interview details how Sandusky gained Fisher’s trust when he was 11 years old by acting as a “father figure,” taking him to sporting events and encouraging him as an athlete. Eventually, Sandusky began inviting Fisher to his house for weekends, and that is where the abuse happened.

Penn State announced that it will not renew the contract of Tim Curley, the athletic director who has been on leave since November, when he was charged in the Jerry Sandusky case.

It has long been assumed Curley would not be involved with the program, with president Rodney Erickson saying that acting athletic director Dave Joyner would keep his job as long as he remains president. But that becomes official with the confirmation that the school will not renew Curley’s contract when it expires in June. Curley technically still holds the position of athletic director, but Joyner has been in charge ever since Curley’s indictment.

Hello readers. October has been eventful one for Penn State, as Jerry Sandusky was sentenced to 30-60 years in prison, which essentially amounts to a life sentence. Also, last week, Mike McQueary sued Penn State for firing him under the state whistleblower law. I’ll delve into each with help from my friend the inquisitive non-lawyer that I made up.

So Jerry Sandusky is going to spend the rest of his life in prison?

Five victims released statements before the sentencing -- three spoke in person, one wrote a letter and the fifth relayed their words through their mother. The theme for every statement was mostly the same.

In June, Sandusky was convicted of 45 counts of sexual abuse. On the eve of his sentencing, Sandusky released an audio tape claiming he was innocent and he was given an unfair trial. The message was the same Tuesday when he spoke directly to Judge John Cleland. The plead for innocence was not taken well by his victims.